Flesh And Blood

“A brunette Lauren stripped with – they both did the party scene. Back when you were in business. Was that one of your subsidiaries?”

“Uh-uh. I specialized.”

“In what?”

“Networking. The tools of commerce.”

“Nuts into bolts,” said Milo. “So Lauren and Michelle were freelancing on the side?”

Gretchen smiled again. “You’re cute.”

“Did you have a Michelle on staff?”

“It’s a common name.”

“How about a last name?”

Gretchen placed her lips next to Milo’s ears. Flicked his lobe with her tongue. Gave a soft, dry laugh. “I have nothing to offer because I’m nothing. A speck of lint in the navel of the least important creature in the universe. And that makes me free.”

“You’re anything but nothing,” said Milo. “I’d say you’re a presence.”

“You are so sweet,” said Gretchen. “I’ll bet you treat the girls gently.”

Milo’s turn to smile. “So how about tossing me a bone? Off the record. Michelle what?”

“Michelle, ma belle. Sont les whatever.” Gretchen began toying with the crayfish. “Those eyes. He’s like, Let me sit on this plate dead and get all shriveled up but leave me intact, I just don’t want to be chewed up.”

“Lauren didn’t end up intact.”

Gretchen sighed. “They really should remove the eyes.”

Milo said, “So that’s it? Nothing?”

“Have a nice day,” said Gretchen.

On the way out we met Ingrid returning.

Milo blocked her way. “Lauren Teague was murdered.”

Lavender lips parted. “Oh.” Then: “Who’s Lauren?”

“An old friend of Gretchen’s.”

“I’m a new friend.”

“I don’t think so, dear,” said Milo. “I think you and ol’ Gretch go way back – Ten to one I can get hold of your sheet like that.” Snapping fingers in front of her face. “Seen Michelle recently?”

“Michelle who?”

“My, my, the same old song – Michelle the tall brunette who used to dance with Lauren.”

Ingrid shook her head. Milo’s hand closed around her arm. “We can discuss this in my office or you can continue your meal.”

Ingrid’s eyes burned fiercely. She craned to get a look at Gretchen’s table.

“Don’t worry,” said Milo. “I won’t let her know you told me.”

“Told you what?”

“Michelle’s last name.”

“I don’t know any Michelle. I’ve heard mention of Michelle Salazar – Did Gretchen eat anything?”

“Not much.”

“Damn! She needs to eat. Please don’t bother her lunch again.”

CHAPTER 14

MILO PUNCHED THE MDT’s keypad, ran a search on Salazar, Michelle.

The screen lit up. Three hits: Michelle Angela, 47, with a record for larceny, Michelle Sandra, 22, imprisoned in Arizona for manslaughter, and Michelle Leticia, 26, arrested two years ago for prostitution, a year after that for possession of narcotics.

“There you go,” I said. “The age is perfect.”

“Echo Park. Let’s go – Would you recognize her?”

“No, it was dark,” I said. “Maybe.”

Michelle Salazar lived in a two-story, peach-colored sixplex on a twisting street one block east of Micheltorena and two blocks north of Sunset. A brown sky hung low over the potholes, boxy hieroglyphics sang gang sagas, small children played in the dust. Two doors up a cluster of shaved-head young men in white tank tops and baggy pants crowded an old white van, sharing cigarettes and beer and lean looks.

As we got out of the unmarked, some of the beer drinkers watched us. Milo’s gun hand was relaxed but in the right place as he threw them a salute. Big group effort not to respond. We were in Ramparts Division, where a police scandal had broken a couple of years ago – CRASH officers forming their own criminal gang. LAPD claimed the bad cops had been weeded out. LAPD had denied the existence of bad cops for too long to have any credibility.

The lock on the building’s front door was missing. Inside, a dark central hall was ripe with the gamy perfume of too-old menudo. Mailboxes set into the right-hand wall were padlocked and unmarked. Milo knocked on the first door, got no answer, tried the next unit and received a shouted “Si?” in response.

“Policia.” Reciting the word quietly, but there was no way to make it inviting.

Long pause, then a woman said, “Eh?”

“Policia.”

“Policia por que?”

“Senora, donde esta Michelle Salazar, por favor?”

Nothing.

“Senora?”

“Numero seis.” A radio was turned up loud enough to block out further discourse. We made our way to the stairs.

Different smells up on the second floor: sour laundry, urine, orange soda.

Milo rapped on number 6. Another female voice said, “Yeah?” and the door opened six inches before he could respond. Held in place by a loose chain, bisecting a woman’s face. One watery brown eye, half a parched lip, sallow skin.

“Michelle Salazar? Detective Sturgis-” The door began to close, and he blocked it with his foot, reached around, undid the chain.

I didn’t recognize her, but somehow I knew it was her.

Last time I’d seen her, she’d had two arms.

She wore a green nylon robe with moth holes on the lapels. Thirty pounds heavier than when I’d watched her dance with Lauren. A once-pretty face had puffed in all the wrong places, and sprays of pimples crusted her forehead and chin. The same luxuriant mop of jet-black hair. One hand held a cigarette with a gravity-defying ash. Her left sleeve was tied back at elbow length. Empty space from the shoulder down.

“Oh, shit,” she said. “I didn’t do anything – please leave me alone.”

“I’m not here to hassle you, Michelle.”

“Yeah, right.” The room behind her was squalid with dirty clothes and old food and clumps of what looked like dog waste on gray linoleum. As if confirming that, a small, hairless thing with a white-fringed head pranced across my field of vision. Seconds later a high-pitched yelp sounded.

“It’s okay, baby,” said Michelle. The dog mewed a few more times before withdrawing to tremulous silence.